It's been a while since I've been on the blog. The fall seems to have swallowed me up WHOLE. Back to school and kid stuff, participating in an anthology, finishing up Break Point and general life has take everything from me.

Thanksgiving is looming around the corner. With heavy and large promises of pie and Black Friday sales, I'm most taken with you. You, my readers. Some are new and many are old. I met some of you with my first release, Electrified, and you've been there ever since. In between, with every release, I've connected with more of you. TO ME, that is the best part of writing. It gets harder and harder to keep up, but I'm determined to do it.

I love hearing when you have babies or anniversaries. I adore when your kids win swimming meets or get good grades. I hate to hear you are getting divorced, but I'm thrilled when you're moving on and making a life...

What's new with me? The usual: musicals at my youngest son's school, basketball for the oldest, a new book or three on my laptop, and edits coming in soon. Oh, and I'm playing holiday music already!

In light of the holiday spirit, and I know this time of year can be hectic and expensive for many, I'm running sales throughout November and December.

I ditched the vapid, soulless high-society life of Los Angeles for the promise of something more meaningful in rural Ohio. Accepting a track scholarship for college, I tried running my way to happiness, but instead I ended up sleeping with my French professor and falling head over heels for him.

When that relationship fell apart so did I.

Barely hanging on by a thread and using the most absurd coping skills, I was determined to hide behind my past indiscretions. That was, until I met Tiberius Jones.

Never in my wildest dreams did I think I’d learn the truth about love from a six-foot-five basketball player.

**To win a signed paperback copy of the book, swag pack, and $25 Starbucks gift card, post a picture of Vérité on your eReader device and tag me on Facebook or Twitter and comment below that you did it!!

Good luck! I will pick one lucky random winner using random[dot]org on Tuesday June 23, 2015 at 10 p.m. EST

“To be honest,” he said in a low voice, “I saw you outside the dining hall that first night we met. Then when I realized we had study hour together, I was pumped. I thought you were a freshman, and you took my breath away. Not only were you stunning, but I saw the way you consoled your friend in the courtyard. Don’t panic or any shit like that; I’m not some crazy stalker. I just liked the way you looked and acted, that’s all. After chatting with you for a quick second, I decided I’d never met someone tough and sweet like you. Yeah, I was turned on, but also interested or something like that. Where I come from, people are either tough or nice, but not both.” “Seems to me that you’re both,” I interjected, my kind words coming out of left field. I bit my tongue, silencing myself, and continued to listen quietly, finally raising my gaze to meet his.

“I wanted to get to know you, but I was nervous and made a stupid joke about your name.” Taking a deep breath, he seemed to gather his courage. “Look, I’m just a dude from the streets with a bad Jersey accent and a pretty good jump shot. I get where you’re at . . . you don’t want any part of a brother like me. But that’s not me. I’m not just some guy who plays ball. I’m a decent person.”

Looking up into his pale blue eyes, so amazing with their openness and vulnerability, I felt my protective barrier shift. His warmth chipped away at my outer layer of ice, melting it away as I admitted, “I was just being overly sensitive about my name.”

“Either way,” he said, “I don’t know anything ’bout your past, and quite frankly, I don’t care now that you told me. We all got secrets and history, so you’re not scaring me off with your sordid shit. But I get you don’t want anything to do with the likes of me, all young and ghetto, but I’m twenty and probably seen more than you ever did.”

Available at Amazon, Nook, and iBooks on 6.15.15

Excuse me for a moment because I'm about to get all sappy...it could just be that Hello Again by Neil Diamond is playing. OR not. It may be...a year and a few days ago, I hit publish on my first novel. With one stroke of a button, I put all my hard work, blood, sweat and tears on the line. My friends bought it, my mom read it, and soon...a small group of unknown-to-me readers read it. Some loved it, others abhorred it. My editor told me to strap on a thick skin (in a much nicer way); my husband assured me that if I didn't receive any bad reviews, I hadn't really gone mainstream; my mentors said to just write another book.

What did I do? I dried my tears and wrote another book. Well, actually two more in a year's time. I just kept typing, dreaming, and marketing. OH, the fucking marketing. It's 97 & 1/2% of my day. Marketing. There are fun parts of this like talking to readers––the ones who like your books––and meeting bloggers. Bloggers are hard-working people who actually do work-for-free most of the time. If not, they make pennies while helping us––authors––with marketing. All for the love of reading and romance in my case.

There are not-so-fun parts like ad placement and reading bad reviews, feeling the need to apologize that my book wasn't your cup of tea (I really do feel this way), blogging myself, running giveaways, etc. Most of these are not all bad just tedious and keep me away from writing. I'm not going to lie, reading a bad review hurts, but I get over it now. AND I have Nicole now. She makes everything better...are you reading this Nicole?

Anyway, I digress (a bad habit of mine). A year after publishing Electrified, it's still growing and gaining new readers/fans (?!?!) and sometimes I run to the mirror and check that I'm still standing...and this is happening. BTW, Pam is going to shoot me over the run-ons here, but it's my party, and I'll clearly run-on if I want to!

I continue to be shocked how Electrified is still moving and shaking. Sienna is special to me...Asher even more so––at times. Smoldered was my most emotional to write, and clearly polarizes audiences to the max. I was still a new & fairly dumb idiot back then, and I made Asher an absolute cheating prick with a heart of gold. I love him that way.

Redemption Lane brought a new set of characters and a less glitzy background. Lane and Bess made me cry, Jake makes me swoon...I'm writing him now. And then there's my soon to be released, Tiberius. He's not what you think, debunks all those preconceived notions you may have, and was totally new for me to write.

It wasn't planned this way, but somewhat ironic that the cover reveal for Vérité fell on the same week as Electrified's anniversary. Yesterday blew me away, toppled me over––and that's not easy when you're 5'10. Thank you so much for all the messages, emails, texts, posts etc - bloggers, readers, friends, enemies alike.

Bloggers who were on vacation reached out, new reviewers sent messages for my current books and wanting to be on the list for upcoming titles, and my mom forgot (I think she did, but she played it off). There's also the other authors I've met and fallen in love with...too many to mention. But they really have circled around me when this author stuff got too hard and celebrated with me when it's going well.

So, just thank you. Thank you so much for making this last year incredible. I look forward to the next few - Rachel XOXOXO

I’ve been a little down this week...
After putting a few finishing touches on my latest work-in-progress and getting it ready to send to my editor, a huge let-down washed over me. It is hard to explain, but it happens to me every time I finish a story. There are those long endless days or weeks that all seem to blend together. The days I’ve spent all alone with those characters––in my robe, drinking coffee, eating nothing but snacks and breaking only for Chinese takeout with my family. My brain begins to think like the people I’m writing as I hum the music they’d listen to, and they are very, very real to me. Not in some psychotic sense, but in my mind, the main and side characters come to life, instructing me to put their story on paper.

As a person, I don’t generally squee or eeek or gasp over the people who come to life in my imagination. Perhaps, I’m overly attached and nervous to share. Maybe it is an unhealthy dose of separation anxiety or nerves over whether you––the reader––will accept my characters. Often, they’re flawed, not perfect beings trying to live their lives and fucking up while they do it.

With my latest project, I realized that if I want or need to do one simple thing as a writer, it is to make my readers think and question what they are told to believe.

Starting with my first heroine, Sienna. She’s a religious woman turned stripper––not for kicks, but for freedom and safety from her tyrant of a husband. At one book club, I was called a particular religion basher and asked why I wrote this? I took it in stride, as Sienna is a survivor, my woman of valor who commanded her own destiny, and wasn’t created without the necessary research. When you dig, you find, and that’s what I did. If I made one or two readers question what may be hiding underneath some, a very few, and definitely not all religious sects than I did my job.

Then, there’s Asher, the star of my Electric Tunnel series and Smoldered. He is such a psychological wreck, the product of no parental supervision and a degenerate of the Las Vegas streets who did the best he could. He cannot get his personal life together, and he cheats and acts a fool and tears down homes and ruins relationships when love is right in front of him. Some hate him, won’t read him for his lousy cheating ways. To me, he’s every bit as lovable and broken, and watching him climb out from under the boulders weighing down on top of him makes me fall a little bit harder for him. After all, the notion is not all of us came from the same loving place where we learned to cherish what’s in front of us. Sometimes, men and women need a swift kick in the ass as adults to understand this.

I’m not going to take apart each of my characters. They all have their own distinct issues and hurdles, and writing their journeys, bringing to life their passion and pitfalls––that’s my greatest passion. In my latest––Vérité––I decided to take a different approach. A good guy meets a screwed up, mixed up, train wreck of a girl. I take down stereotypes––not just gender roles, but way more. Creating people who are not what you think they will be, breathing life into them has been my main focus for the past two months, and now I’m sending them to get them ready to share.

I already miss them, hope you love them, and treat them with the same respect I’ve come to have for them. So, it is a bittersweet moment like sending your kid to kindergarten. It’s time to let go, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy.

Woohoo, I've been writing nonstop, and I'm so excited to reveal the FIRST ever teaser and excerpt for vérité! This story took hold of my brain, and I just had to let it out. A steamy new adult book that will make you think and question where the truth can be found when it comes to love. Sometimes it's in the most unexpected places...

I ditched the vapid, soulless high-society life of Los Angeles for the promise of something more meaningful in rural Ohio. Accepting a track scholarship for college, I tried running my way to happiness, but instead I ended up sleeping with my French professor and falling head over heels for him.

When that relationship fell apart so did I.

Barely hanging on by a thread and using the most absurd coping skills, I was determined to hide behind my past indiscretions. That was, until I met Tiberius Jones.

Never in my wildest dreams did I think I'd learn the truth about love from a six-foot-five basketball player.

My new friend sat next to me, very tall and yet broad. I couldn’t stop my eyes from drifting, taking little side glances at him while I pretended to read. The room was warm, and when he tugged off his hood and lifted his sweatshirt over his head, his T-shirt rode up, revealing the standard-issue six-pack for male athletes.

I shook my head, forcing myself to focus on the book in front of me, but my attention wandered again as he pulled out a textbook for freshman English. God, he’s a freshman. Was that what I was reduced to…ogling jail bait?

The guy was crazy handsome in an exotic way. His skin was a rich brown—neither dark nor light. In stark contrast, his eyes were the palest shade of blue I’d ever seen. They were two translucent aquamarine orbs that complemented a perfectly formed nose, well-defined eyebrows, and luscious lips. His hair was clipped tight, but would probably curl if allowed to grow. And then there were his arms. Every time he moved, his sleeves lifted past his bulging biceps and defined triceps.

There was zero fat on this dude’s body. He was a specimen. For a freshman. Not to mention, he was probably one of those beer-pong-loving jocks about to turn frat boy.

And I wasn’t getting involved with anyone—certainly not with a party boy with looks to kill, and trouble written all over his long, lean frame.

I hadn’t realized I’d spent the whole hour studying this kid until the proctor stood and dismissed us. When I tossed my book back into my bag and stood to leave, the object of my obsession unfolded himself from his tiny chair and said, “Hello, officially this time. I’m Tiberius. Guess I’ll see you tomorrow night?”

“I guess,” I said, and turned to head toward the door.

“You got a name?” he asked from behind me.

Surprised, I turned to face him and hugged my bag closer, like a shield. “I’m sorry, that was rude. Tingly,” I said, waving my fingers in the air as if they were asleep and all tingly. It was my go-to expression when telling someone my name, really more a defense than an explanation. I’d rather make light of something so toxic than reveal the disgust that rolled through my stomach every time I heard someone shout Ting…leee.

“Well, I dunno know what sport you play, Tingleee, but you could definitely win the weirdest-name-I-ever-heard contest,” he said with a chuckle. “This may be the first time I met anyone with a stranger name than me.”

Sadness bled through me. God, even this kid couldn’t just leave my name be; it did nothing more than remind me of my past. The one before Pierre, the real reason I was such a mess. Except there wasn’t enough therapy in the world to get me to relive that shit.

“I know,” I whispered as I turned again to leave.

“Tingly,” he called out. “Hey, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it. Don’t be mad; I thought it was funny. I don’t know. I’m so stupid,” he yelled after me.

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